How I wrote an opera about Anna Nicole Smith

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After tackling Jerry Springer, creating an opera about the wild, doomed stripper-turned-socialite was a no-brainer

Act one The Wanting

I’d love to be the subject of an opera. To be mythologised on stage. Perhaps
Anna Nicole Smith would have loved it too. I can’t swear to it — I never met
her. But her life certainly lends itself to opera.

People ask me if she’s worthy. What’s “worthy”? And who gets to decide?
Everything is a fitting subject for an opera. Every life lived contains
glory and tragedy. If we live our lives on a scale of one to ten then most
of us, most of the time, experience something between three and seven. Anna
was